FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Vanderbilt evened the series with Arkansas with a 4-1 win Saturday afternoon at Baum Stadium behind starter Grayson Garvin.
The left-hander turned in eight strong innings to earn his fourth win of the year. Garvin struck out six and allowed one run on two hits with two walks. The Razorbacks were held hitless in six of Garvin’s eight frames and scored their only run in the seventh inning on a solo home run by James McCann. Navery Moore worked around a leadoff walk and an error in the ninth inning to notch his fifth save of the year.
The Vanderbilt offense jumped out to a three-run lead in the third inning when Tony Kemp led off with a single and Mike Yastrzemski reached on an error. Anthony Gomez then extended his hitting streak to 19 games with a single and came around to score on Jason Esposito’s two-run single. Arkansas’ second of three errors on the day led to the Commodores’ fourth run in the fifth inning. Kemp paced the Dores’ nine-hit attack with three hits with Esposito and Aaron Westlake adding two hits each.
Razorbacks’ starter Barrett Astin was saddled with the loss allowing three runs, one earned, on five hits over four innings. The Arkansas offense was limited to a season-low two hits.
The Commodores and Razorbacks face off tomorrow afternoon in the rubber game of the series at 1:05 p.m. Senior Taylor Hill gets the ball for VU against Arkansas’ Randall Fant. The game will be televised and can be seen on ESPN3.com.